The BMA will show up on the app’s front page if you’re in the Baltimore area. Otherwise, just search for “BMA” to find us in-app.

You can also send us your thoughts through this blog, to Facebook or Twitter using the #BMAVoices tag. 100 contributors by December 31 will win a $10 gift card to the new BMA Shop. You need to share your response with the hashtag so we can identify you as a winner.

A 3D replica of The Thinker, on the steps of the BMA. Find these around Artscape for your opportunity to win a high-resolution bust of yourself created by Direct Dimensions.

Today is the first day ofArtscape – America’s largest free arts festival. Always a major feature on the Baltimore cultural landscape, the annual event includes theater, dance, and opera performances; classical, a cappella, and experimental music; street theater, fine art and crafts; film; and children’s activities. This year, The BMA is offering multiple opportunities for visitors to Artscape to interact with us.

BMA Biggest Thinkers – Tell us your best memories, biggest ideas, and burning questions at the booth, on social media, or at blog.artbma.org. In appreciation, the top 100 participants will receive a mini replica of The Thinker created from Direct Dimensions’ high-resolution scan of the BMA’s sculpture.

Thinker Scavenger Hunt – Search for any or all of the five 9-inch 3D replicas of The Thinker placed around the festival, take your photo with it, and post it on Twitter or Instagram with #bmabigthinker for a chance to win a high-resolution bust of yourself created by Direct Dimensions. The winner will be announced Monday, July 21.

Free 3D Face Scanning – Stop by the BMA booth to receive a free 3D face scan from Direct Dimensions with the option to purchase your likeness as a 3D selfie, Lego piece, bracelet charm, mug or other products from ShapeShot.com.

We look forward to seeing you at Artscape! Drop by the BMA’s booth and get a fan or a face scan, and tell your stories of the BMA via social media using the #BMABigThinker hashtag. We’d love to hear from you.

Artscape is on in the Mt. Royal area of Baltimore City from Friday, July 18 through Sunday, July 20. You can find the BMA’s booth located on the plaza next to MICA’s Brown Center (1301 Mt. Royal Ave.)

In 2014, the BMA is commemorating its 100th anniversary, and we’re spending a lot of time thinking about what it means to be a museum turning 100 in the 21st century. How has the BMA changed in the past century, and how might we change into the future, to better serve the needs of our communities? What should our Museum look like and do in the coming 100 years?

Be a #BMAbigthinker

The answers to such questions won’t be found only inside the Museum, of course. So we’re turning to you! As the BMA celebrates its 100th, we want to get to know you: your memories of the BMA, and your hopes, dreams, and your vision for its future. We also want to help you get to know us. What do you want to know about the BMA? Ask us anything!

Tomorrow at Artscape, we’ll be launching the #BMABigThinker campaign, inspired by Auguste Rodin’s The Thinker, which we recently 3D scanned, we want you to:

Get involved! Drop by the booth at Artscape tomorrow or let us know using the #BMAbigthinker hashtag on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook, comment on the blog, or get in touch! What are your best memories, your biggest ideas, and burning questions for the BMA? We’d love to hear from you.

Direct Dimensions’ 3D scan of Auguste Rodin’s The Thinker in The Baltimore Museum of Art collection

The BMA has one of only 21 authorized “heroic” sized casts of Auguste Rodin’s The Thinker in the world, and in June this year, we partnered with Maryland-based Direct Dimensions, Inc. – a leader in 3D scanning technology – to do a 3D scan of the sculpture.

The move is part of the BMA’s initiative to increase its use of 3D scanning in the digitization of its collection. We were inspired to see how utilizing 3D scanning technologies might allow us to see The Thinker differently, and to discover what other people might be able to do with such scans if they were made available to scholars and the public via the Internet.

Museums are beginning to embrace the possibilities for digital scanning for multiple purposes, and the BMA has previously partnered with Direct Dimensions to scan works for scholarly research. In 2004, Direct Dimensions was engaged to scan two separate castings of Antoine-Louis Barye’s Walking Tiger. By scanning the two tigers and overlaying the resulting 3D models, the BMA was able to dimensionally inspect and compare the two castings.

The Museum again worked with Direct Dimensions in 2007 and 2008, in support of the exhibition Matisse: Painter as Sculptor, which featured more than 160 sculptures, along with paintings and drawings from the artist. BMA curators were interested in utilizing the scanning technology to discover more about Matisse’s creative process as a sculptor. Their analysis of the scans led to the discovery that bronze casts of the same edition had considerable differences in their methods of construction, patination, finishing, and size, contributing to knowledge about how Matisse created various casts.

These kinds of scholarly and conservation-driven research projects offer some of the most tantalizing outcomes for 3D scanning and printing in museums today. For instance, conservators can use deviation analysis of 3D data to compare the condition of a collection item against a past state, or curators can use the technology to learn more about the techniques of artists, as the BMA did with the Matisse sculptures.

The BMA’s TheThinker – a 6-foot, 6-inch sculpture – was presented to the museum in 1930 by Jacob Epstein, a collector and member of the first Board of Trustees, and displayed in front of the entrance to the John Russell Pope building until 1971 when it was moved inside for conservation. Though originally intended to represent the poet Dante, The Thinker has become a symbol for thinkers and creators around the world.

We have plans to offer our scan of TheThinker to the world, by putting it into the public domain along with the nearly 9,000 images and related information about objects in the BMA’s collection that are already available on our website. This will be the first time we’ve made available a 3D scan of a BMA object, and we’re looking forward to seeing how it might be used by scholars and the public all over the world.

What do you think? How might you use a 3D scan of TheThinker? What would you like to see us do with this scan?

To find out more about 3D scanning, join us this weekend at Artscape, where we’ll be joined by Direct Dimensions for activities inspired by The Thinker.